The seasonal question, "Can I rake your leaves?" usually comes from young boys looking for pocket money. This time a middle-aged man stood at my door.
He had a wild black beard and shoulder-length hair that escaped his baseball cap, eclipsing his clean jeans and neat denim jacket. The clothes that hung off his too-thin frame suggested they too were expecting rejection.
I hesitated. Living across from a well-treed park meant more leaves than spare time, but I had no cash on hand.
"Ten bucks an hour," he said. "I need money for groceries." He had a rake in his hand and an earnest look in his dark, deep-set eyes.
"Will you take a cheque?"
His turn to hesitate. "What the hell," he said. "I trust you."
We agreed on two hours of work, and Bob began to rake. Periodically he'd return, sweating and panting, to ask for more leaf bags or clarification on where our property ended and our neighbour's began.
Each time his questions were peppered with curses and remarks about how hard the work was. He was right. Wet leaves are heavy.
"I'm not as young as I used to be," he told me, wiping his forehead. "My 42 years have caught up with me."
Only a year apart, he looked a decade older than me.
At the end of two hours, Bob came for his payment. "You sure have a lot of leaves," he said.
I agreed. As I wrote the cheque I said the date out loud: "November 11th."
"Crap!" Bob looked panicked. "I forgot. It's Remembrance Day. The banks are closed."
I was about to dismiss this as an inconvenience. After all, the banks would open again tomorrow — but tomorrow is a long way away when you're hungry.
I foraged in my purse. Amid bank slips, sales receipts and toothpaste coupons, I found a $10 bill. Mad money, tucked away in case of an emergency. Bob agreed to take half in cash and the rest by cheque.
I was going to ask him to spell his last name, but left "pay to the order of" blank. Part of me was protecting his privacy. Part was sidestepping the risk he was illiterate.
He took the cheque and left without giving it so much as a glance. Once he was out of sight, I inspected the yard. His work fell somewhere between half-assed and adequate. I'd have to finish the job on the weekend, but at least he put a $20 dent in it.
Two hours later, Bob was back, grocery bag in hand. "Where's your bank?" He handed me the cheque. "I never thought to ask, but I don't know where this bank is."
I explained that it was legitimate. I wasn't about to cheat him out of a few dollars.
"Yeah, but I need to know where the bank is in order to cash it." Bob was getting agitated. He began to talk quickly, explaining over and over again how he hadn't thought to ask.
"It's okay," I said. "Your bank will cash the cheque even though I don't bank with them."
"My bank?" Bob looked confused. "But I don't have a bank account."
"Oh …" I looked at the cheque. This was one of three bank accounts I have, not to mention joint accounts with my husband.
I remembered opening my first account with my dad when I was 9. Barely tall enough to see the teller, I felt important as I signed the deposit slip. How ironic. My first deposit was for $10 and I felt like I owned the world. How much food would this $10 buy now?
Then I remembered the change tin. "Would you mind 10 loonies?" I asked.
"Sure. Whatever. I don't care."
I left Bob and his groceries standing on the kitchen porch while I rummaged through the unsorted coins we toss absentmindedly into a chipped and dented antique tobacco tin. Our chump change, dumped at the end of the day to unload our cramped pockets — as if the money were a burden.
There was something demeaning in paying him with coins but, as Bob said, he didn't care. Rock-hard coins beat worthless paper every time.
I gave Bob the loonies. "Here, count them to be sure."
"It's okay," he said. "I trust you." This was the second time he trusted me — a woman at home alone with an agitated stranger at her door. I wondered who had more at stake.
We were both apologizing now. "I'm sorry I never thought to ask about the bank."
"I'm sorry I only have coins."
When Bob and his bag of groceries had turned the corner, I tore the cheque in half and in half again and again until only tiny scraps remained. I dropped them in the recycling bin and stared at the fluttering leaves as the wind undid Bob's work. I meant my apology. I'm just not sure what I was sorry for the most.
Charmian Christie lives in Guelph, Ont.
